The leak of a subset of Windows NT and 2000 code to the Internet may result in an intellectual property nightmare for one Windows ISV, but by Friday afternoon, fears about a potential security disaster had simmered down substantially.
On Friday morning, BetaNews.com reported that the source of the leaked code--a small subset of the overall Windows code--had been traced back to Mainsoft, a Microsoft partner that entered a source code licensing agreement with Microsoft in 1994
The San Jose, Calif, company develops tools for porting Windows applications to Unix and ported the software giant's Internet Explorer and Windows Media Player to non-Windows platforms.
Observers in both the Windows and open source communities claim the leaked code won't give hackers significantly new avenues to exploit, but it could pose a long term IP problem for the software giant and potentially Mainsoft.
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